Darren Burke

Doncaster MP Ed Miliband has poked fun at former chancellor George Osborne being appointed as a newspaper editor - by joking that he is to take charge of Heat magazine.

In a shock announcement this morning, it was revealed that Mr Osborne has been appointed to take charge of the London Evening Standard - despite never having been a journalist.

And the Doncaster North MP and former Labour leader was quick to respond to the news, which has sent shockwaves through the media industry, by jokingly announcing he was taking charge of the glossy lifestyle magazine.

He took to Twitter to tell his 564,000 followers: "Breaking: I will shortly be announced as editor of Heat magazine...."

The tweet has already been liked more than 4,600 times and retweeted 3,800 times.

The magazine jokingly replied: "Excited to welcome you on board, Ed."

Heat is one of the UK's biggest selling magazines in the UK with a circulation of more than half a million.

Meanwhile, Mr Osborne said he was "thrilled" to succeed Sarah Sands, who is leaving to edit the BBC's Today programme.

He had ambitions to be a journalist as a young man but failed to get a place on The Times' trainee scheme after graduating from Oxford University and was briefly a freelance reporter on the Daily Telegraph's diary column before entering politics.